Keith Hudson's Musings

Who is Satoshi Nakamoto?

More specifically, who is Satoshi Nakamoto if he is indeed the person who invented Bitcoin and its central concept? This is that if knowledge of the movement of each unit of currency is spread aroound widely enough then it’s tantamount to trusting the currency — something that’s badly lacking in national currencies.

Ever since Bitcoin was launched in 2009 by Nakamoto, those who are high up in the world of cryptography have even tying to find out exactly who he is. One person with that name was traced in America but he turned out to be someone whose hobby was model railways. Even now his identity is of the keenest interest. The latest person to be proposed by Wired magazine is Craig Steven Wright, an Australian. He has provenance in the field of cryptography but he denies authorhship of Bitcoin.

There’s little doubt that Bitcoins an astonishing invention and parts of the technology is now being studied and copied by many banks and other organisations. If its creator could appear and make himself into a consulting corporation he would be worth $1 billion immediately. Nut never mind the money, it is vastly intriguing to me why he or she still remains anonymous and doesn’t take the credit. The only inventor I can think of who remained anonymous after publishing some of his path-breaking ideas was the great Thomas Young (1773-1829).